Hmmm...tax
I personally think capital gains tax is long overdue - in Australia if you earn a buck you get taxed on it, whereas over here if you earn a buck through working you get taxed, but if you earn a buck through owning something you don't. With capital gains you don't actualy add anything that wasn't there yet you get richer.
As for tax rates, I would rather pay high taxes while earning good money and live in a safe, productive country with a future than pay low taxes in a country where the economy is collapsing, incomes are stagnating or even dropping and social services are degenerating. Earning $100,000 a year and paying 40% tax is better than earning $70,000 a year and paying 15% tax, especially if your 40% tax means roads are better cared for, hospital waiting lists are shorter, unemployment is lower, crime is lower etc (like in the Scandanavian countries).
We have been fed a mantra of tax cuts since the days of Rapernomics and told that the only way to lift productivity is to cut taxes, and tax cuts are best funded by cuts to civil services (called bureaucracy) and to benefits. I'm a little different in that I believe the best way to lift productivity is to make it easier to be more productive. Increase R&D funding so we can develop high value exports instead of relying on milk powder. Encourage private investment in industry instead of rental houses, increase skills by putting more apprentices on the payroll and get the growing 40+ population to gain new and more contemporary skills so we can continue to be a productive part of society for longer (and deal with agism) and subsidise engineering and technology degrees because they're the ones that will be worth big money. And invest in protecting the value of our clean green brand and find better ways to capitalise on it than jetboating or bungy jumping.
I heard an economist on the National radio a while ago who said it was actually cheaper to have tens of thousands of people working for the Ministry of Works and Railways etc doing bugger all for a reasonably low wage than having the same people doing nothing on the dole when you factor in the costs drug and alcohol probllems, crime, mental health etc. Probably some truth there.
Don't blame me, I voted Green.
Originally Posted by Winston001
Sod it, gotta go out and its cold as a widows teat. Been chewing over the Capital Gains Tax so any excuse for delay...
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but I think you'll find that's just central government, and probably just income tax based revenue. The correct method of determining how far 'Er Magesties servant's pricks are up your arse is to ask yourself how much of the country's hard-earned passes through their hands.
.... never ever in a million years! 
It's not part of their make up! 
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